


Words Unspoken

by KittenFair



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Genre: GFY, Gen, Rude-centric, Stream of Consciousness, Turkfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-02
Updated: 2013-05-02
Packaged: 2017-12-10 04:13:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/781644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittenFair/pseuds/KittenFair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was always the quiet ones you had to watch out for. Rude wasn't much for words, with a straight face and mild tone, dark eyes hidden behind darker glasses. He had the strength and calm of the ocean.</p><p>But even the ocean stirred under storms, currents running deep, unseen beneath the surface.</p><p>There was far more to him than anyone ever knew.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Words Unspoken

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flecksofpoppy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flecksofpoppy/gifts).



> Request: Rude, things that make him come apart. As we see him, Rude is a quiet character who often plays 'sidekick' to Reno, at least in the sense that Reno does the talking and Rude backs him up. Rude is one of my favorite characters in the Compilation, and I'd ADORE to see pretty much anything about his psyche. Particularly though, I'd be extra appreciative to read an exploration into what makes him come apart - what makes him come unglued, get angry, feel unstable, or even show his emotions? This could be anything at all; I'm down with pairings, gen fic, g to nc-17. I would just love to see an exploration into Rude's innermost thoughts, and a bonus is seeing what makes him unravel.

Two years.

Two long, hard years, in the wake of one that was a nightmare beyond comprehension, even for someone who’d lived through it.

“ _The world was nearly obliterated’_ ’ Reno had said, crashed on the couch in Healen with the same expression he was wearing inside. Disbelief. Awe, edged with horror. Resigned acknowledgement, as well, as he said the truth they all had come to terms with.

“ _And we were the obliterators._ ”

How _do_ you atone for that? He didn’t have an answer for him. Not really. _Could_ you atone for that? And really... should they? Things were changing, slowly. ShinRa wasn’t what it had been under the old president - wasn’t even what it had been back then, when Rufus took over.

The company was a shadow of itself, with a skeleton staff and no real forces remaining. So much had been destroyed...

“ _It could be a new start._ ”

New in what way, though? Rufus talked repentance, but he wasn’t sure. Then again, the man _had_ grown up. A _lot._

Rude still remembered, back before the Nightmare and Meteor, back when Rufus had been a teenager full of ambitions and no remorse for how he achieved them, everyone a tool to be used or an obstacle to be defeated. The first AVALANCHE. SOLDIER. The rest of their department, too.

They’d been a force to reckon with. Not that they weren’t _now,_ not exactly, but with just the four of them… Tseng was a damn good director, fiercely loyal, composed, intelligent, and dedicated – everything they could ask for. Veld had been right to say he was worthy to be the new head of the Turks. But he could only do so much with what he had. Limited resources, limited manpower. At least they weren’t in the spotlight anymore.

 

**…out of sight… out of mind…**

 

Strife hadn’t been surprised to know they were around, though there seemed to be something akin to shock to find the President still alive, even if he was confined to a wheelchair.

He had the distinct feeling he was saying that he felt sorry for _him,_ though. Not Rufus, with his injuries and the stigma. Rude, for having to _put up with him._

There would have been a time he echoed the sentiment.

Rude hadn’t always liked Rufus. To be honest, initially he’d hated him. Rufus had funded AVALANCHE, had betrayed their trust. Had gotten Veld killed and scattered the rest like feathers blown in the wind, casualties in his ambition to overthrow his father.

After what had happened with Lazard, you’d think they would have seen it coming. But the Shinra brothers were clever, with all the intelligence and sharp cunning that had gotten their father to his power back then. The old man had literally gotten fat and lazy, greedy and foolishly believing every silken promise Hojo made him.

When Meteor had loomed overhead, threatening Midgar – the _world_ – things had shifted, somehow, for them all. Maybe it was having all the others come back, one last time, to help. Maybe it was realizing that fighting AVALANCHE, the _new_ AVALANCHE that Strife had cobbled together, was a lot less important than making sure they all _lived,_ and a forcible rearrangement of his priorities.

Whatever else it was, it was a wakeup call.

People talked about seeing your life flash before your eyes, when death is coming close enough to stare at. It didn’t flash for him, though. It was like a slow movie reel, or a real old projector slide show. And it was the strangest things, too. Nothing particularly profound, in the bigger scale, but ones that had made a deep impact on him.

 

_Realizing Veld was some strange sort of father figure, in a world where your father had no problem arranging for you to get your ass kicked until you learned how to win, and somehow made it worth it with a small little smirk of approval._

_That moment when he’d realized he’d sold his soul, and that the price to get it back would be his life._

_Discovering that Reno had stages of ‘drunk’ and that somewhere between ‘tipsy and adventurous’ and ‘unintelligible mumbling peppered with swearing’ he could be oddly philosophical._

_The day Elena decked Reno and actually knocked him over._

_Seeing Tseng in a hoodie and realizing he was just as human as the rest of them._

_Losing Chelsea, and swearing off romance._

_Meeting Tifa Lockhart, and realizing that some fights he didn’t want to win._

Staring up at the blazing meteor overhead as Tuesti and the other Turks worked to evacuate people, he felt a strange tightening to his chest. This could well be it. He’d imagined dying more than once, in a lot of ways, but this… _Meteor_ … was something he never could have imagined. But then, this wasn’t the first ‘impossible’ situation he’d faced. And maybe he wouldn’t succeed, this time. Maybe this time, it would be all over and they’d all die. Maybe maybe maybe.

There was no real point in worrying about that, though, was there? What would happen was going to happen.

 

**… out of time to decide…**

 

As it turned out, though, Meteor was just an end of an era. For a while, though, he wasn’t sure if it wasn’t the end of _his_ world anyway.

People had scattered.

He didn’t know where Reno was.

Hadn’t seen Elena.

Hadn’t seen Tseng, but unless someone had forced him to go rest – which they probably should, since he’d nearly _died_ not too long ago, but good luck with getting him to give a damn – he had a feeling where he would be.

The president was assumed dead; Diamond WEAPON’s attack had struck the floor with his office head on. But there was no body, not yet. And Tseng was stubborn enough to _look._

Which left him with a decision to make.

 

**Should I run?**

 

No one was there to see him leave. No one was there to make him stay. He could walk away, now. Shed the suit and everything it stood for. Start over.

No more being a Turk.

It had been done. He’d seen Valentine.

Could he do it?

 

**Should I hide for the rest of my life?**

 

Somehow, he found his way to the ruins of the ShinRa Headquarters. Somehow, he found himself slipping past a pale but fiercely determined Wutian and lifting the rubble in silence as they retrieved the broken but not dead body of their president. Somehow, he found himself staying, while Tseng arranged for a pickup.

Rufus, he would reflect later, was a damn stubborn man. Tseng level stubborn, which said a _lot._

Had the same disregard for mortality, too.

He was stuck in a wheelchair to begin with, which he hated, but even he had to admit it was necessary until he was strong enough to reliably walk around on his own.

But he refused to give up, and his general attitude to the rest of them was ‘suck it up or get the hell out’ because he wasn’t going to keep someone there if they wouldn’t give as much as he was giving.

And he was giving it his all, this time _._ House bound, this time because of his health instead of an arrest, Rufus still never _stopped._ Even when the ugly black stain of Geostigma began to spread over his skin, he didn’t give up. If anything, he just dug in and braced himself. The man who had once wanted to rule the world with fear apparently had decided that no one should live a life dictated by it.

It was oddly inspiring. And Rude thought maybe that was why he had stayed. Why he kept putting his life on the line. Then again, he didn’t exactly work for ShinRa Incorporated anymore. The company was quite literally in ashes. When he said it now, he meant _Shinra._ Rufus Shinra.

If nothing else, life was always interesting. You had to have a taste for danger, to last as a Turk. If you just wanted to wear a suit and have power, be an executive. Turks were the Shadow Hand of the company, the darkest of the dark. They lived and breathed, faced and wore the faces of death and destruction. They went where others wouldn’t dare follow, let alone go by themselves.

Once, he’d done it because it was a job. Then because it was a job that you ‘retired’ from in a body bag – _if_ there was anything left. Then it was because of Veld, because he was a man worth following.

When Veld had been ‘killed’ – and it would be a long time before he found out that Tseng had fooled them, that the old man was still around, waiting and watching with the others – he felt the first stirrings of discontentment. Yeah, he hadn’t always liked the job, but it had never crossed his mind that maybe it would be better to get killed off than to stay.

But it crossed his mind a lot, for that first while, while everything began to go downhill _fast._

He thought he’d done a good job not letting on, though. The only person who might have known how many times he’d considered walking away after Meteor was Reno. Damned redhead always knew a hell of a lot more than people gave him credit for. Yeah, he had his moments where he was a little less than on the ball, but for the most part it was an act. Not that he wasn’t a messy, irreverent, impulsive thrill-seeker. He was. But he was _clever,_ and had the skills and guts to match. He’d taken Strife on, toe to toe, without flinching, even when he’d known more about what the blond was than Strife himself had. That took a hell of a lot more guts than people seemed to understand. Then again, some of the things they’d gone through still seemed so surreal, it was pretty hard to believe for _them,_ too.

People used to make wisecracks about people ruling the world, or destroying it, even. Sephiroth took it a hell of a lot more seriously. It wasn’t a good feeling to have him – and the only people who could beat him – as enemies.

Tseng had given them all an out while they waited to see if Rufus would live – cryptically, but clear enough after working together for so long – and he could have made a clean cut then and there.

It had been tempting.

 _Really_ tempting.

He’d thought about it, a lot. He’d been _so close,_ too.

Quiet he may have been, but Rude was the type who thought a lot more than he spoke. Introverted, maybe, but not particularly shy so much as he just liked his privacy and wasn’t a big talker. And Reno did enough talking for them both; it made them a good match, strangely. Reno would talk and talk and find ways to get reactions and information while Rude would _watch_ behind the cover of his sunglasses, and unravel every last secret there was to find. Add in Tseng and Elena, and they had become a strong unit over time, filling in the little gaps in each other’s skill sets.

In the end, that was a big part of what made him stay. He still had blood-kin, off in Costa. But he didn’t _fit_ there, anymore. Every time he went back to his childhood home, visiting and checking in, as much as he loved it… he _knew._ Home wasn’t there, anymore. Home wasn’t Costa.

It wasn’t Midgar, either, or Edge, or Healen.

Home was in the constant chatter of a redhead with unruly hair and too many crazy ideas; it was in the big brown eyes of a little blond who could pass for any little small town sweetheart, right up until she got down to business with sharp aim and even sharper martial arts skills she’d honed for years; it was in a slim Wutain man whose broad shoulders bore burdens he didn’t even know – didn’t _have_ to know – and a small little smile so much like Veld’s it hurt.

It was in the man who was at once vulnerable and stronger than ever, who had come full circle from traitorous rebel to oppressive ruler, and back around again, rebelling against death itself this time, leading them _all_ to fight for their lives, in a way that meant _so much more_ than a simple combat situation.

That was where he belonged. His new family. His _home._ And even with the world fallen apart in corroding pieces around them – in many ways literally – it was alright. Better, in some ways, for the raw truth of it.

 

**Can we fly?**

 

But there were just the four Turks, now, and a big mission could – did – take three, even if Reno was just dropping off and waiting to pick up Tseng and Elena. This time, though, even he wasn’t left behind to guard the President – was he that? ‘Sir’ still fit him. He couldn’t picture calling him ‘Rufus’ out loud even now. A lot had changed, but it was watching what kinds of hits people could take and _still get up_ from that impressed him a hell of a lot more than never getting hit. Rufus Shinra was definitely at ‘sir’ level.

 

**Do I stay?**

 

Of course everything went south up north, in the crater where all of ShinRa’s issues began. He was fairly sure the president had meant well, but sitting there with Reno, listening to _Reno_ talking about everything with such stark honesty…

 “ _Seriously, though. How are we ever supposed to atone for that?”_

If there was a good answer, _he_ didn’t have it. But his silence was enough for Reno. He knew – _always_ knew, the brat. But he loved it just as much as he hated it.

_“Hope they’re alive.”_

 

**We could lose. We could fail.**

 

They were. His mind wouldn’t – couldn’t – believe anything else. _Sephiroth_ , the nightmare himself, had cleaved into Tseng so deeply the man would always bear horrible scars, and still, the man had come back to them.

Three little bratty wanna be Sephlings _weren’t_ going to take down the Director of the Turks.

“Tseng’s just like the president.” He’d noted, moving from the window back to the couch, sitting by Reno again. “They’re kinda like cats. Nine lives, you know?”

Aquamarine eyes lit with the inner glow that was _Reno,_ and he smirked as the redhead flopped back on the couch again with his own agreement and a wide grin.

Then there was smoke, black and cloying, and one of the little silver demons – the leader, as far as he could tell – was there. Fast, strong, and crazy. Not Reno-crazy, where it was a mix of cool calculation, experience, and gut instinct. No, this was the same crazy that wanted to destroy a planet and go sailing with mommy.

And as much as he hated to admit it, Crazy kicked their asses. The President was cool about it, though, even stuck in his wheelchair and weak from the stigma with the little brat ranting. He took advantage of it, too, clever bastard. Subtle little questions, prodding the kid into talking more, getting information.

He was after Jenova, of course. Sounded as much like Sephiroth as he looked, at least in what he was saying. His voice was lighter, younger. Not the deep rumble that the former SOLDIER had, the sort that made you stand to attention even if you weren’t In his department. But that just made it all the more obvious that the kid – remnant? – was less than all there.

It was hard – really hard, not to react beyond a grimace when he saw two blood spattered ID cards hit the floor.

_“Swear on these.”_

Yeah, he’d do that. Maybe he couldn’t take Crazy and his brothers on head-to-head, but he was a _Turk._ He worked from the shadows, and he’d be sure the guy who _could_ beat the hell out of him _did._

 _I swear to the Planet itself, you bastard, you_ will _die._

 

**In the moment it takes to make plans**

 

Strife wasn’t hard to find, for once. Back in the Ancient’s church, where he’d seemed to be staying lately. The surprise was finding Lockhart with him, both unconscious and curled in the flowers. She’d been in a fight, and from the damage to the pews, he had a sinking feeling it was another remnant.

Well, she’d lived, at least; felt strong and warm in his arms, a pleasant distraction from Reno’s grumblings when he had to bring Strife back.

SOLDIER he may not have been, but he was just as heavy, dense with his enhancements.

And just… dense.

 

**… or mistakes …**

_“You’re a real handful.”_

Yeah, yeah the blond was. Not like he could exactly blame him for all his baggage – he figured at _best,_ he’d had mako poisoning, amnesia, PTSD and some sort of identity issues that may or may not have been ironed out by now. That was a hell of a lot to deal with even _if_ he’d had time to ‘get help’ instead of being on an insane journey to track down and ‘stop’ Sephiroth.

But he _had,_ and damn it, the man had better pull it together because they needed that strength _now._

_“The base is all yours.”_

At least he got moving when he had a target. That was one thing – when Strife’s demons were _outside_ his head, at least, he had no issue fighting them.

Funny how that worked.

 

**… thirty minutes, a blink of an eye …**

 

Once Strife got going, things started moving faster. Victory or defeat, they’d find out soon. The little brat – Kadaj – took the President. That left the other two to him and Reno.

They were smarter than he’d honestly thought, given their brother seemed like an overpowered child. Then again, the big one didn’t exactly come across like a ‘grown up’ even at his size.

“ _You meanie.”_

Of course, there was also that summon they’d called. He had a sinking feeling he knew where Strife’s materia chest went… but right now, they had their hands full. He and Reno were good – _damn_ good, arguably the best full partnership the Turks had seen since Veld and Valentine – but they were a hell of a lot more breakable than the silver demons, even _if_ they were a hell of a lot brighter.

He wasn’t sure if Rufus just had fantastic timing – because this was unquestionably a flash back to the rather arrogant youth he’d once been, leaping off a building with Kadaj, who now _had Jenova’s head_ –

 

**… thirty minutes to alter our lives …**

 

\- and the man was _damn lucky_ that he didn’t fall to his death.

He was a little too relieved to see Tseng and Elena to comment, though. A quick look to each other, silent communication in an instant that said so much more.

 

_How are you?_

_I’m here, aren’t I?_

_We’re survivors._

_We’re_ Turks, _yo._

 

And for all that he’d been ‘stuck’ in a wheelchair, Rufus was there a moment later, cool blue eyes assessing – he’d lost the bandaging somewhere in the fall – evaluating them and the situation as they all waited. See what he would do. What he would say.

Well, Shinra?

He tipped his head up, a defiant glint in his eyes.

_We’re not dying today._

_Go._

**… thirty minutes to make up my mind …**

 

He wouldn’t go so far as to call them ‘good guys’ – _any_ of them, because AVALANCHE had plenty of innocent blood on their hands – but they were on the right side of it. Redemption? Atonement?

Saving their own asses?

Did it _really_ matter, in the end? He didn’t think so.

Tuesti would probably be bitchy about the highway, which made him smirk as much as getting to use the rocket launcher did.

He couldn’t say he’d ever expected to get run over by a motorcycle _inside a helicopter,_ but it’d make a hell of a story later.

 _“Hey Rude, you’re alright!_ ”

Peachy.

But he knew what he meant. He was alive and able to fight, and that was ‘alright’ enough mid-mission, even though having Reno peeking out the door while the chopper spun out of control just… wasn’t reassuring. At all.

And seriously, he _kept_ the control stick? The hell.

On the note of insane coworkers, how did Elena sound like her entirely-too-chipper rookie self again in the middle of this? The woman kicked ass – he’d _seen it_ – and she had to have survived horrific torture at the hands of those silver haired brats. And there she was, tossing them a rope with a cheery grin.

He grinned back, though, when he got up the rope and saw what she had. Never mind she’d been in his stuff, never mind there was _nothing_ polished about them, there was something about demolitions that just put a smile on his face.

 _“Hey, partner? This thing… got any_ bite _to it?”_

He smirked lazily at Reno, eyeing the piece in his hand fondly. Times like this… bombs had almost a poetic irony to them, in their hands. It looked crude. Cobbled together. It had _tape_ on it.

“ShinRa technology at its finest.”

ShinRa wasn’t what it once was, mass producing weapons – both metal and flesh – and wasn’t all sleek elegance and pompous parties. _Their_ president had a double barreled shotgun he kept in his jacket, and the aim to shoot a box he’d tossed off the building _while falling after it,_ without so much as an apparent concern about how he would land.

It was a different world, now, held together by the sheer will to _live_ of those who had survived. Edge, literally on the _edges_ of the ruins of Midgar, was raw and broken.

Crude.

Cobbled together.

 _“Oh, so_ you _made this?”_

Hell yeah he did. And no, they weren’t the polished, fancy explosives that Scarlet had her minions churning out by the case. He’d sat in his room at the lodge, working quietly at his desk at some point off the clock, working with a delicacy that most people wouldn’t expect him to be capable of and finding a certain peace in the process, dark humor in the irony of creating something to destroy.

It was raw and rough, stripped bare of all the fancy touches, and that very thing that would have made the Head of Weapons Development sneer at him is what made it one of the best damn things he’d ever used on a mission. Things had changed, and they had, too.

“If nothing else, it’s... flashy.”

Well… mostly.

 

**… thirty minutes to finally decide …**

 

“ _Oh good._ ” Reno gave him a lazy smirk, almost sensual with the thrill of danger as he watched him flick open a lighter with a casual, practiced motion.

“You love it, I know.”

 

**… thirty minutes to whisper your name …**

 

The redhead laughed softly, shifting a bit in place to get at his own. “ _Looks like today we’re clockin’ out early.”_

Strife zipped past, their jackets and Reno’s rattail fluttering at the burst of wind in his wake.

They were gone before the pair chasing him could catch up, but they left a present. Probably wasn’t going to kill them, but it would slow them down. The little one was on his own with Strife, long enough for the blond to get down to business. And unless he’d missed his mark, that big airship he’d seen was Highwind’s new one, which meant that he had a lot of backup. Hopefully, someday he’d realize what ‘team’ meant.

 

**… thirty minutes to shoulder the blame …**

 

Yeah, yeah. They’d screwed up. _A lot._ Even Rufus admitted that, now. Not just to persuade Strife, either.

 

**… thirty minutes of bliss – thirty lies …**

 

ShinRa’s golden era was gone, and there was no getting it back, even if they’d wanted it.

Watching the storm brewing over where Headquarters once stood, the flashes of ‘lightning’ that could only be swords hitting with superhuman strength, Rude decided that it was probably for the best. Time to find _his_ team.

 

**… thirty minutes to finally decide…**

 

Where Elena had gotten that wheelchair, he had no idea. He suspected there was a chopper warming up somewhere nearby, though. Tseng must have been the one to talk Rufus back into it. He was persuasive like that.

The five of them were the core of ShinRa – _Shinra_ – right now. Four Turks and their president, sitting. Waiting. Had they done enough, this time?

 

**carousels in the sky that we shape with our eyes**

 

It was taking a while. More cat and mouse? If they’d managed to bring back Sephiroth, he wouldn’t be too surprised. He’d gone from cold and calm to calm and creepy when he took a nosedive off the deep end those years back. That kind of sadism really wouldn’t be too much of a surprise. Honestly, people seemed _more_ surprised to find out he’d been a decent guy once, even with all the company put him through.

 

**under shade**

 

He felt for him, in a way. Creeped himself out to realize it, but… he sort of pitied him. Maybe ‘human’ was stretching it, but Sephiroth had been a person. A hero, even if he hadn’t wanted it. And it wasn’t just ShinRa that made him that way – he’d been there, back then. Yeah, the silverette was awkward with social things, but he _did_ care about the other SOLDIERs. More than once, he’d seen tiny smirks grace his lips as he let his bangs hide his eyes a moment, or nudge one of his friends with a hip or shoulder as they stood together, speaking in the barest of whispers for enhanced hearing only.

 

**silhouettes**

 

And then those friends were gone, and then they were _dead._ Standing there, staring at the black clouds seeming to descend in the distance, he wondered if Sephiroth had felt as gutted as he did? Did he chill to the core when Zack Fair came back, the Buster Sword strapped to his back, the way he had when Tseng had shot Veld? When Genesis mocked him, acting like he meant less than nothing – was just an _obstacle_ to be conquered - did he feel as sick and angry as _he_ had at Rufus’ betrayal?

And then Nibelheim… back to his beginning, though Sephiroth hadn’t known it. Where he’d been born, decades ago. The birth of everyone’s nightmares on that fateful mission. ShinRa’s dark history out in the open, ready to cast a shadow that had threatened the entire Planet.

Then again, people had been saying that about ShinRa for a long time.

 

**casting shade**

 

Reno had summed it up well, once, when they’d been dragging his happy self back from a bar and listening to him musing on life in general. He’d stopped them to blink up in surprise at the ShinRa Tower from a ways away, pointing to it.

_“That’s a damn big building, partner.”_

He’d grunted at that, nudging him to get moving again.

He had, of course, though after a while, he’d noted in the quiet. “ _A place that big… it has an even bigger shadow, yo.”_

As Turks, they knew what sorts of things hid in ShinRa’s shadows.

 

**crying rain**

 

The first drops of rain were a surprise, since they were all practically holding their breath, watching the dark clouds clearing over Midgar – hoping it meant what it looked like.

It was a gentle rainfall, almost delicate, and Rude had the strangest feeling he could smell… _flowers_ ….

 

**Can we fly?**

 

Green tendrils, wisps of light rising like incense smoke, took away the taint of the disease that had been ravaging Rufus.

He felt his heart skip a beat, mind flashing to wise emerald eyes and an innocent smile as a little slip of a girl tucked a flower into his hand and sent him on his way.

That had to be a good sign, right?

 

**Do I stay?**

 

Rufus was quiet, watching the inky stain vanish from his hand and tentatively stretching it as the last flickers of green faded, the sound of rain a soothing backdrop. Their suits were all getting soaked through, but they stood in silence, a dark guard of the four elite who remained by their president’s side, even now.

 _“Second chances,”_ the blond murmured, voice almost too quiet to be heard even over such a soft rain. _“We_ could _rebuild ShinRa.”_

What, exactly, that would mean, he wasn’t sure. Rufus had always been ambitious, though. He dreamed big. He was the sort of man who could change the world with his ideas. Love him or loathe him, the man got the job done. And he could be charismatic when he bothered to be.

“ _ShinRa owes the Planet a lot.”_ Familiar words, just as true as before. “ _It’s our responsibility to set things right._ ”

There was a different tone, this time. It was hard to place it, at first, because it had been so long since he’d heard it.

Hope.

Not that the blond had ever admitted to anything being hopeless while _he_ was around, but… there was more of ‘I’ll rest when I’m dead’ than ‘I’ll rest when I’m done’ feeling to Rufus’ stubbornness lately.

 _Now,_ though… he watched his hand – clean, unmarred skin moving smoothly as he clenched it. There was a light of determination and a return of the fire that had characterized the young leader for so long. _“We have a lot of work to do._ ”

 

**We could lose.**

 

There was no guarantee they’d succeed. They weren’t cut out to be heroes, not the ‘save the world’ type even when most of the world was company property in all but name.

 

**We could fail.**

 

But, if they could start with just not _destroying_ the world, that’d be good. Start small and all that.

 

**Either way…**

 

The only guaranteed failure was if they _didn’t_ try. He took a moment, breathing the clean, sweet air in deep with a breath of a sigh, face tipped up to let the rain run over his face. It had been one hell of a ride. He’d _never_ seen any of this coming, even once he’d thought himself pretty jaded. Never had the kind of mind to even dream this up.

That was people like Rufus, who got people like him into this sort of mess. People like Sephiroth. People with the kind of power to shake the world to its foundations _and then some._

 

**… options change…**

 

Chuckling caught himself off guard, once he realized it was his own. It wasn’t so much that there was anything funny about this, really. It was just…

 

**Chances fail, trains derail.**

 

… they were _alive._ The second coming of Sephiroth – hopefully the last of him, but certainly not the last of the company’s demons come back to haunt them – and there they were, standing in the rain that smelled like the little Ancient’s garden. Rufus was healed of the stigma, so odds were that everyone else out in the rain was recovering, too; a symbolic cleansing, with this second defeat of the Calamity’s Son.

Over two thousand years ago, Jenova had nearly destroyed the Planet. The Cetra stopped her.

ShinRa’s scientists dug her up, and gave her children a little over thirty years ago.

Less than ten years ago, those children went insane.

Two years ago, one returned and nearly destroyed not only the company that had orchestrated his birth, but the entire Planet.

 

**… thirty minutes, a blink of an eye …**

 

Thirty minutes ago, Kadaj had gotten his hands on the remains of Jenova.

 

**… thirty minutes to alter our lives…**

 

Standing in the rain, he let himself laugh, if quietly, just because it was such a _relief._ He didn’t need someone to fix everything for him, didn’t think any of them would know what to _do_ if they were handed the keys to paradise, honestly. But having an actual _chance_ was one hell of a welcome change.

Without geostigma taxing his body, Rufus would finally recover from WEAPON’s attack. Rude could practically see his mind running at full tilt as he made plans again, and pitied Tuesti a bit because he was about to have a lot more ‘help’ than he would know what to do with.

And Tseng, because he’d probably be writing it all down, and be a half-heard sounding board for the whole thing.

 

**… thirty minutes to make up my mind …**

 

His glasses were wet with rain, and he removed them, returning his attention to the others with a smile. Sure enough, Tseng was listening to Rufus’ plans. Elena was on her PHS, likely at their president’s request.

Reno was watching him, and gave him a shark’s smirk. “ _Gonna rebuild the world, yo._ ”

He shrugged, smirking back and tucking his glasses into his jacket. “No job is impossible for the Turks.”

 

**… thirty minutes to finally decide …**

**Author's Note:**

> Gray lines in the fic are lines from t.A.T.u's "30 Minutes" - which seemed to fit, despite having a different plot. I hope this filled your prompt nicely, flecksofpoppy!
> 
> ~ KittenFair


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